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Critics Corner
Chuck Dixon Rant
Bridget Haines
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| March 18, 2002 |
Ok, its time for me to put in a little bit
of a rant here. Chuck Dixon is a well-respected
comic writer, who has the notable distinction
of being able to write multiple DC Comics
and other company books simultaneously. At
first, this seemed like a great thing to
me, because a lot of Chuck's writing was
great. He usually handled Nightwing and Robin
fantastically. But the man is not infallible,
and he seems to have blundered over the last
year or so, through a crisis of character
integrity and time-perception problems. Since
his announcement that he is leaving his writing
detail at DC for supposedly greener pastures
at Crossgen, he has also done a few things
in the books he normally handles well, which
come off as childish…its almost as if he
wants to destroy everything he's created
rather than have someone else write it in
the future.
First off, yes, Birds of Prey is a great
book. I enjoy it a great deal and up until
recently I felt Chuck's portrayal of Babs
and Dinah was fantastic. But with the whole
Ra's al Ghul storyline, he degenerated Dinah
into a blonde bimbo who apparently has never
done any research on one of the biggest threats
to humanity on the planet (something Kevin
Smith did a great job of pointing out the
absurdity of in Green Arrow #12). Being as
Black Canary was a member of the JLA and
JSA, and has worked frequently with Batman,
Oracle, and Nightwing, I find it rather hard
to believe that she would have no clue whatsoever
that the guy she was dating was the infamous
genocidal bio-terrorist, the Demon's Head.
It isn't like Ra's was wearing a disguise,
or does he fall under the same impenetrable
disguise logic of Clark Kent? Is it a case
of without his green cape (a la Kent's glasses)
no one can tell he's the same person? Also,
Superman is well aware of who Talia al Ghul
is from her recent stint in Metropolis, are
you telling me he hasn't passed that info
on to the JLA and JSA at all? Puh-leeze.
And hello!? Didn't Dinah just have a fight
with Bane in one of Ra's al Ghul's Lazarus
Pit locales a few issues back? Are you telling
me she has that short of a memory?! The whole
story was incredible unbelievable, and I
found myself hoping Oracle would wake up
and it was all just a bad dream. That never
happened though.
It was also quite a bit out of character
to have Dinah suddenly determine that Barbara
was trying to monopolize her life or steer
her wrong. These two women have a tight bond,
they have saved one another's lives, and
they are friends, trusted friends! Dinah's
sudden rejection of Oracle and her advice
was pretty out of character for the Canary.
I know Chuck wanted to give Dinah back her
cry, that's great, it's nice to see her become
whole again in body (and leads me to wonder
if something "special" will come
of her and Ollie's recent passionate night
in Green Arrow #12) but for God's sake, don't
turn the woman into a complete idiot to achieve
your goal! There are a hundred other ways
you could have given Dinah a dip in the Lazarus
pit.
Now, how about his characterization of Lady
Vic? Now here he goes against his very own
characterization of a villain. In the early
Nightwing issues penned by his own hand,
Lady Elaine Marsh-Morton is a GREAT character,
vicious, brutal, cold and murderous without
any seeming moral weaknesses. She uses a
little girl as a body shield in a firefight
on a boat! She slaughters people out of hand
as "collateral damage". There is
no hesitation, no mercy, and certainly no
fear in her. She holds her own against the
likes of Nightwing, one of the best combatants
in the DC Universe. She has a touch of depth
through her attachment to her antique weapons
handed down through her family. She is shown
to be equally brutal in Titans, where she
helps to kill Addie Wilson, the insane Hive
Mistress, while working with Tartarus. This
of course, puts her on Deathstroke's bad
side, as Addie was his ex-wife.
In the Hunt for Oracle cycle in Birds of
Prey and Nightwing, Chuck turned Elaine into
an incompetent fighter and a weak-willed,
frightened woman who crumbles the moment
things don't go right in the jungles outside
Gorilla City. She's terrified of Slade (please,
this woman would NEVER show fear), and she
gets her butt handed to her by monkey thugs.
I can see Canary kicking her around, as Dinah
is one of the best martial artists in the
DCU, or Deathstroke, as he's metahuman…but
one of Grodd's common flunkies? Please. Having
her turn into Dinah's weepy, scared little
pal, only to be ditched, was hugely out of
character for Elaine. And a bad misstep.
Now we have bigger missteps recently during
the "Bruce Wayne: Murderer?" And
"Bruce Wayne: Fugitive!" story
lines. Here we seem to have a persona switch
between Tim and Dick entirely. Dick has always
been the one to rebel against Bruce, and
to chafe against everything he does. He joined
the Titans, moved to Bludhaven, became a
cop, all against Bruce's wishes, and with
a lot of bad blood. Not even a year ago he
was panicked over a murderous Batman coming
close to killing the Ventriloquist over the
death of the real Matches Malone. Batman
lent him no aid when he was framed for murder,
forcing Dick to clear his name all on his
own. Yes, granted, there has been a bit of
reconciliation due to the official adoption,
but still, this unflinching loyalty to Bruce
in the face of contrary evidence was disturbing
until finally Ed Brubaker slapped the former
Boy Wonder back into shape in Batman #600
and had him blow up at his mentor.
Tim on the other hand, has always been the
Bat's staunchest supporter and conscience.
His abandonment of Bruce during the Officer
Down situation, when Bruce needed him the
most, was the beginning of the downward spiral
of Bruce's behaviors. Great plot device to
get us where we are, but since Chuck had
zero interest in participating in the crossover
(and showed his disdain for it by cramming
his less important story into the forefront
of the murderer and fugitive issues of Nightwing)
I'm pretty sure sparking off the crossover
with Tim's absence affecting Bruce was never
his intent. I've always liked Tim as the
glue that held Bruce together, and for him
to not only walk away, but to widen the gap
because he felt slighted that Bruce, in an
attempt to mend things, told Stephanie his
identity to free him of that burden, was
taking things a touch too far. I can see
the kid being peeved for a few weeks, but
this long? And to not come back around during
the murder situation, and to have him blatantly
voice he thinks Bruce might be guilty, well
that just doesn't sound like Timmy to me.
Also, during the crossover the continuity
of Wing's book has been a disaster. Somehow,
over the course of issues 65-67, seemingly
1 day has passed, 2 at the most, regarding
Dick's journey to Gotham to see Bruce in
jail, and his return to the Lockhaven fire.
In reality, there is several WEEKS worth
of time spanning Dick's actions in those
books and its one big time-bending mess.
Then we have Barbara, who also has all but
decided Bruce is guilty as charged. Yes she
is probably the least emotionally attached
to Bruce of the whole Bat Family, but its
wrecking her relationship with the one person
she IS emotionally attached to. She has let
her opinion put a huge wedge between her
and Dick, just as things were getting to
be great between the two characters. She's
acting almost antagonistic and temperamental
and I believe Barbara has become a better
person than that in the last few years.
I guess most of all it feels like Chuck is
trying to wreck all the playground toys he
built before someone new comes in to play
with them. That is rather unfair to the base
of loyal fans that has developed for the
books he had written so well at first. If
he wants to go out in such an immature fashion,
why isn't there an editor somewhere saying
"Whoa Chuck, I can't let you do that…you're
really messing up the characters in the books
and its going to make it damn hard for a
new writer to pick up the pieces."?
Please people, lets see a touch of maturity
and a little less burning of bridges!
~B.
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